


Kindling for the Fire

by Lysical



Series: Prompt Fics [15]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: Another 'You Know Nothing Tom King' Fic, Conflict Instigation, Gen, I would literally challenge Tom King to a duel, Jason Todd is Competent, To Resolve Future Conflicts, fight me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-27
Updated: 2017-05-27
Packaged: 2018-11-05 11:30:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11012550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lysical/pseuds/Lysical
Summary: Sometimes you have to clip some wings to stop small time criminals from taking flight as a new criminal empire.If that results in them breaking each other's necks, well, that's not Jason's problem.





	Kindling for the Fire

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt fic for anon, who was offended by Tom King's gross comments about Jason (weren't we all) and wanted a fic showing off his tactical and fighting abilities. This is the former, but I'm sure I'll have more fic with the later eventually :D

A meeting was happening on the sixth floor of an unremarkable office building near Gotham’s East End. The building was a front for one of the East End’s mid level crime families. They were meeting with a splinter group that had formed from the dissolution of Black Mask’s criminal empire.

Jason knew all about the meeting because he made a point of taking apart every remnant of said empire and grinding them into dust. He also knew exactly what they were discussing because he’d gone in a few hours before the meeting and bugged the place.

They, on the other hand, had no idea who was watching them through the scope of a sniper rifle from the rooftop of a building on the opposite side of the street. More fool them.

Unfortunately for Jason, while the guys he was watching through the scope had no idea what was coming for them, someone else did know what he was up to and they weren’t shy about making their opinion known.

“Hood.” Oracle’s voice had that disapproving tone that got his back up, the same one that made Cass pout and that Steph called ‘the Mom Voice’. “What are you doing with that gun?”

He very briefly pondered switching off the comm and just ignoring her, but Oracle had cards up her sleeve that Jason could really do without her playing at the moment. It didn’t matter which she picked, Jason didn’t need big brother or big sister showing up.

With a sigh, he raised his hand to his ear. He’d ditched the helmet off to the side for the time being and just made do with a domino. He wouldn’t have bothered but Dick had pointedly started dropping the things off in his safe house and some things were not worth the earache of arguing about. There was a soft click in his ear as he tapped the comm on. “I’m not doing anything, Oracle. Don’t you have anyone else you can stalk?”

“Not when you’re sitting across the road from a gang meeting with a rifle in your hands.”

Jason rolled his eyes, aiming his head so the security camera she was probably spying on him through caught it.

“Don’t make me call your father, young man.” That was definitely amusement, hidden under the slightly robotic cadence of the voice modulator.

“For the love of—” his shoulders hunched defensively. He’d rather take both his older siblings, together, than deal with Batman. “Come on, I haven’t even done anything.”

The ‘yet’ hung in the air, unspoken.

Oracle made a thoughtful noise. “I suppose I am being unfair to you.”

There was nothing about that sentence that wasn’t a trick. Jason refused to take the bait. Unfortunately, his participation didn’t seem necessary.

“You never even argued with Bruce about your curfew—”

“—Oh here we go,” Jason muttered, rolling his eyes. At least they were on a private comm line. “For your information I snuck out when I needed to, okay?”  

“—or his coffee ban—”

Jason hung his head, closing his eyes for a moment. “Seriously? We have to do this now?”

Thankfully, the meeting across the street chose that moment to break up and Oracle fell silent. Polite handshakes were exchanged, dirtbag to dirtbag, before the visiting men left. Jason put his eye back to the scope and observed the men leaving before switching to the ones that remained in the office, drinking what looked like scotch and discussing the deal that had been negotiated.

Oracle cleared her throat. “You seriously chose to just watch a meeting through a rifle scope?”

Jason pulled the trigger.

There was panic in the meeting room as the window shattered, raining the men inside with shards. They dived for cover and then the shouting started, more men bursting in from the next room. Jason ducked behind the ledge of the rooftop before he could be spotted and started to take the weapon apart. He’d have a few minutes before he needed to get off the rooftop.

He was just putting his helmet back on when Oracle came back over the comm line.

“You missed.”

Jason got to his feet and sprinted for the opposite edge of the rooftop, getting his grapple ready as he ran.

“No. I didn’t.”

***

A few blocks away another meeting was taking place, between a few thugs of the same splinter group and a lesser known gang that were definitely not in Red Hood’s back pocket. It was business as usual when Red Hood dropped in to break them up.

By the time the police showed up, all the men from the splinter group were knocked out. The men from the other group had managed to escape, Red Hood hot on their heels.

A sniper rifle was found by the police.

It would later be matched to a shooting that had just taken place, a gang related incident that had no casualties.

Jason hadn’t even returned home from patrol before Oracle was in his ear again.

“You started a gang war.”

“I did not.” Jason landed on the nearest rooftop. “I just discouraged further deals and potential mergers they may have been contemplating. I didn’t even harm a single one of them.”

“They’re just going to kill each other.”

“I have no control over what they may or may not do,” Jason said. “And before you start harping on about it, how many times has someone else in a vigilante costume inadvertently caused conflict between Gotham’s various affiliated dirtbags?”

“There was nothing inadvertent about what you just did.”

“No, and so what?” Jason rolled his eyes. “Clip their wings now before they grow powerful, before we end up with another Black Mask. It’s not my problem if they go from wing clipping to necks.”

That was definitely an aggravated sound. Jason grinned.

“I’m not hiding this from Batman.”

“Wouldn’t expect you to.” Batman kept his own tabs on what Jason was up to, anyway, and likely suspected some of it already. “Nice talking to you, Oracle.”

Jason cut the comm and leapt for the next building.

He had maybe an hour to get out of Gotham before the Bat appeared.

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr is [here](http://lysical.tumblr.com).


End file.
